In Opera, the Hume is a road too far

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Opera Australia's music director, Richard Hickox, is
European-based and in only his first year in the job, which may
explain his lack of understanding about the company's Melbourne
operations.

But on the evidence of an interview from London this week, these
lack of understandings are severe.

He challenged the accusation that OA has nearly halved the
number of operas performed in the State Theatre since the company's
formation in 1996 - down from 11 to six, with the addition of a
Gilbert and Sullivan operetta.

"Surely the company is doing more now than it did before the
merger?" he asks.

Such a blunder is only understandable if he assumes the company
is no more than the current version of the Sydney-based Australian
Opera, which merged with the Victoria State Opera nine years
ago.

The Australian Opera presented six shows in Melbourne that year,
including Barrie Kosky's ill-starred Nabucco.

But the present company is the sum of both merger parties. It
absorbed the VSO's sets, costumes and library, although there is
considerable debate about how much of its heritage still
survives.

It was the VSO that performed the other five works at the State
Theatre in 1996.

It is because of this dual heritage that the OA is disputing the
$1.7 million bequest of Edith Melva Thompson, who died aged 95 in
2002, with two other groups, Melbourne Opera and Melbourne City
Opera.

Her will, believed to have been made before 1993, specified that
the money was to go to the VSO. What is in dispute is whether OA
now represents the main interests of opera in Victoria, and so can
claim the money.

The two smaller companies might consider calling Hickox to give
evidence to support their claims that OA is little more than a
Sydney-based organisation now that it has shipped all the
infrastructure associated with the VSO up the Hume Highway to Surry
Hills, leaving behind a vacuum.

Of even more concern is the insight that Hickox's comments might
give into the current attitudes of the company. Who provided such a
prejudiced view to the incoming music director when he arrived
fresh from England?

It demonstrates one of the company's biggest failings - its
inability to brief staff thoroughly on the complexities of opera in
Melbourne, where many believe OA's executives see the two State
Theatre seasons as little more than camping excursions away from
the "main game" of productions in the Sydney Opera House.